USA > New York > New York City > A history of the Brick Presbyterian Church in the city of New York > Part 11
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in time for the use of the new pastor. It measured about thirty by fifty feet and contained an assembly room, fitted with a pulpit, and having its walls, like those of the church, whitewashed-"The Old White Lecture Room," as it was affectionately called by those who in later years remembered it. Here the weekly evening lecture and other meetings were now held, and to this room the session, who heretofore had met in the charity school-house, transferred their head-quarters.
By 1829 the needs of the church had outgrown this building, and it was then proposed to tear down the old addition and erect in its place a "large and com- modious two-story brick session house." Accord- ing to the plan then suggested the new building was to contain large rooms suitable for church meetings and for the Sunday-schools which had now been established,* smaller rooms "for the pastor, session, trustees and for school and church libraries, etc." (probably one room was intended to serve more than one of these uses), "and in addition two or more valuable and pleasant rooms to rent." +
There were two difficulties in the way of this pro- posal. In the first place, the trustees did not feel able to undertake the expense. This was overcome by the guarantee of certain members of the congrega- tion that the money should be provided, from other sources. But it was also necessary, if the plan to rent certain of the rooms was to be carried out, to secure the removal of the restriction in the original lease of the Beekman Street lot by which the church
* As will be described in Chapter XIII.
* For secular purposes.
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was forbidden to convert the land "to private, secu- lar uses." A petition was accordingly made to the Common Council, praying for such a modification of the original grant as would permit the carrying out of the new plan, and this petition was granted. This event was important, not only in its relation to the matter then in hand, but because of the precedent thus established of removing certain restrictions upon the use of the church property.
It was now possible to proceed to the erection of the new building, called at first the session house, but finally named the chapel, and by December, 1832, it had been completed at a cost of about $12,000. It was a handsome structure. Its windows were sepa- rated by pilasters which rose to the eaves. The roof was considerably lower than that of the main church, and the two buildings together made a harmonious design. The arrangement of the interior, according to the best information obtainable, was as follows: on the first floor directly adjoining the church (but not communicating with it) were two Sunday-school rooms, opening into each other, one looking out on Nassau Street and one on the Green. Over these rooms was the large lecture room. Still further in the rear on each floor there were four rooms, two on each side, and between them, with the entrance at the north end, a hallway containing the stairs. Doubtless it was in one of the smaller rooms on the second story that the pastor kept his books and prepared his sermons, "that memorable study," he calls it, "so enbowered, so retired and tranquil amid noise and uproar." The two small, rear rooms on the first story facing Chatham Street (now Park
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Row) were the ones originally designed for renting. The trustees in the end determined that they would themselves provide the money expended in the build- ing, which they were enabled to do by mortgaging the property. The interest on this mortgage was provided by renting not only the two rooms just mentioned, but also, afterward, with the permission of the city,* other rooms not required for religious purposes. In about 1840 the chapel was extended fourteen feet to the north so as to provide more space that might be "let for offices."
The tenants to whom the records refer were a physician, an agent for the Foreign Mission Board, and a publisher and book-seller. The last mentioned, Mr. John S. Taylor, opened his store here soon after the chapel was built and continued it through almost the whole of this period. His advertisement, inserted in a publication of 1838, shows that his was a business not inappropriately housed beneath the eaves of a church. It calls the attention of the public to the "Popular Religious Books, published by John S. Taylor, Theological and Sunday-school Bookseller, Brick Church Chapel, New York." In 1846 another publishing house became the church's tenant, that of Baker and Scribner, whose successors, Charles Scribner and Co., and the present Charles Scribner's Sons have continued the firm's long relationship to the Brick Church by becoming the publishers of the principle works of the church's ministers during the last half century.t
* In 1835 permission was given to rent any portion of the chapel.
t According to the terms of the lease of 1846 the trustees rented to Baker and Scribner for five years "the two rooms on the lower floor of the Brick Church chapel, one of which fronts on Nassau Street, the other
THE BRICK CHURCH ON BEEKMAN STREET Showing Chapel in the rear
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It will be remembered that in the original deed of the land on Beekman Street the use to which it was to be put included the burial of the dead. In the days of which we write it was considered a proper and important part of a church's duty to provide a suitable place of burial for the members of its own congregation, and the natural place for this was con- sidered to be the yard about the church itself. Like Trinity and St. Paul's, though in a much more re- stricted area, the Brick Church had thus surrounded itself with a cemetery. Besides the open. graves there had been constructed early a limited number of vaults which were sold to individuals, and these were increased from time to time until nearly all the available area had been thus utilized, and even some space beneath the sidewalks, by permission of the the city. The flat tops of these vaults, level with the ground and inscribed with the names of the owners, were a familiar sight to all who entered the church or passed along Beckman Street.
In 1823 a city ordinance was passed prohibiting any further burial of the dead .south of Grand Street .* The trustees of the Brick Church had barely com- pleted some new vaults at considerable expense and were dismayed at this sudden and unexpected enact- fronting on Park Row (with the privilege of removing the single partition between the said two rooms for convenience, but at their own expense)." Provision, it is interesting to note, was made for a termination of the lease "in case the said trustees should sell the said premises before the ex- piration of this lease or in case the Corporation of the city of New York should interfere with the present rights of the said trustees held under cer- tain acts of said Corporation to lease said premises so as to divest said trustees of sard rights."
* The plague of yellow fever in 1822 was thought to have started with a burial in Trinity churchyard. See "Westervelt Manuscripts" (Lenox Library), p. 14.
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ment, which, they persuaded themselves, was un- necessary or at least premature. One paragraph of the memorial which they presented to the corporation of the city, stating their grievance, is sufficiently interesting to be quoted. "Your petitioners," they say, "would briefly notice a reason repeatedly urged against a discrimination in private vaults" (such dis- crimination was what they had petitioned for) . . "namely, that it savored of aristocracy. The sug- gestion, it is believed, had great weight at the time; but it is as fallacious as it was popular. Of the whole number of private vaults in this city, one-half are supposed to be owned by those who are in moderate circumstances, and if the remaining half belong to persons of opulence, who can deny that there are hundreds, if not thousands, as well able to own them as they." Possibly this argument did not tend to strengthen their case.
At any rate, the city stood by its ordinance. A few months later a second memorial was presented by the trustees, rehearsing the conditions of the original grant of their land and asserting with some reasonableness that the city's recent ordinance pre- vented the church from exercising a right which had, in return for a certain rent, duly paid, been promised to them forever "without any let, trouble, hindrance, molestation, interruption, or denial." At the same time or shortly afterward an interment was made, in spite of the ordinance, for the purpose of testing in the courts the validity of the city's act. In this contest the church was worsted. But unconvinced, they again memorialized the city authorities, and followed this up by instituting suit against the city for $30,000,
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damages. The sole issue of this proceeding is told with sufficient clearness by the only subsequent refer- ence to the matter in the trustees' minutes: "Ordered to be paid: H. Holden, Esq., costs of suit for breach of covenant, $123.93."*
The limited area around the church was not, of course, its only burying-ground. The Brick Church had also its one-third part of the Beekman lots on the corner of North (afterward East Houston) and Chrystie streets, where burials were made throughout the whole period now under consideration.i
There still remains to be considered the vital question of the income and financial condition of the church during the forty years covered by this chapter. In the preceding period the revenue had been derived from collections and the renting and sale of pews. It became, however, more and more desirable to de- vote the collections to benevolent objects, and at length the pews were made to bear the burden alone. To this, after the erection of the chapel, was added the income of such rooms in that building as were rented for secular purposes. In 1835 this amounted to $925.
The buying of a pew meant little more than the renting of it with the right to hold the same year by year thereafter; and on the other hand, there were decided drawbacks to be encountered. Assessments for repairs, or to make up a deficit, or to meet some extraordinary expense, were by no means uncommon.
* The permission of the city, a few years later, to rent certain portions of the chapel (see above, p. 139), was asked and granted as being at least a partial compensation, for the loss entailed by the prohibition of burials.
t It may be added that this land was sold in 1866 for $64,200. Ground had been purchased in Evergreen Cemetery in 1856.
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And yet from the frequent references in the records, there seem always to have been people who were anxious to buy. It must be added that there seem also to have been people who failed to pay their annual tax or their rent, as the case might be, so that the sale of the pews thus confiscated and of others that were deeded or bequeathed to the church from time to time, provided not infrequent opportunities of purchase.
For the first few years after Mr. Spring's installa- tion the treasurer reported each year a substantial balance. In 1817, however, we learn that an advance in the pew-rents was necessary to keep the church from running behind, and there was a still further increase two years later designed to provide an un- solicited addition of $750 to the pastor's salary. In 1824, the burden upon the pew-holders being evi- dently a subject of complaint, he offered to relinquish $500 of his salary, if the taxes on the pews should be correspondingly reduced; and the state of the treasury at that time must have been indeed discour- aging, for the trustees went so far as to request that he would make the relinguishment unconditional. This he would not do, and they were fain to accept his original proposition. The result was interesting. A meeting of the men of the church was held at once, proposing to restore the pastor's salary without delay to the figure from which it had been reduced, $3,250, by actually advancing the pew-tax. It was thus made evident that, whatever the financial difficulties of the situation might be (and there was no doubt that the church had been forced to borrow money to meet its obligations), the congregation stood behind
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the pastor and were unwilling that he, rather than they, should be made to suffer.
Whether as a result of this episode, or because of objection to the legal contest, being waged with the city at this time about the burial-rights, at the next election of trustees, in April, 1825, the three whose terms then expired were not reelected. Imme- diately the other six handed in their resignations, and although three of these were afterward prevailed upon to remain, the board when it assembled in May was distinctly a new body.
It had to meet, however, the old problems. In the next year with a view to extinguishing the debt and completing certain necessary work on the build- ing, it was again necessary to propose an extra pew- assessment, and to appeal directly to the loyalty of the congregation for support in this unpleasant measure. Yet on the whole the situation as then described by the trustees, though demanding a remedy, was not alarming. "The regular annual revenue," they say, "is barely sufficient to meet the current yearly ex- penditure," and "the debt, although not now large, will soon become so by the accumulation of interest." Evidently a small increase in revenue would at that time have removed the embarrassment.
From 1832 a new source of revenue was added by the renting of the rooms in the new chapel, as above described, but all of the money so received was re- quired in paying the interest on the debt incurred in the chapel's erection, and in the gradual reduction of the debt itself.
Meantime the difficulty in meeting the ordinary expenses of the church continued. Year after year
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the treasurer reported a deficit, which even the old expedient of an advance in the pew-tax did not now serve to check .* In 1839 began a series of loans, sometimes for current expenses, sometimes for repairs or alterations. These appear on the records at rather frequent intervals and reveal a condition of affairs which, to say the least, was undesirable.
But now once more the special emergency was the occasion of showing the church's strength. At the request of the trustees in January, 1841, the pastor undertook to raise from the congregation a voluntary subscription for the purpose of obliterating the debt. In less than three weeks' time he was able to put into their hands the sum of $10,077.22. The subscriptions, he says in his accompanying report, ranged from $1 to $370, and came from one hundred and forty differ- ent persons. "The claim," he continues, "has re- ceived the most prompt and warm response. Six thousand dollars were paid in by the subscribers in a single morning, simply on a public notice from the pulpit." By means of this generous contribu- tion, the entire debt, except the less troublesome mortgage on the chapel was at once paid off, princi- pal and interest, and the congregation set its face to the future with a new spirit of hopefulness.
From this time until 1850 the situation, although not free from anxieties, was more easy. There con- tinued for a time to be a yearly deficit, but a part of this at least could be met from the sinking fund, while by the same means the old debt of $12,000, on the chapel had been finally extinguished. At last, on the very year which closes the period of our
* The financial crisis in 1837 should be remembered in this connection.
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present study, the treasurer was able to report that the revenues had exceeded the expenditures.
When it is remembered that the Brick Church had no endowment whatever, that in spite of a narrow income it not only maintained its original building, but twice over made considerable additions to it, that at the same time, as we shall see in later chapters, it was carrying on a missionary and benevolent work of constantly increasing proportions, and that during the very years when it was beginning to lose in num- bers through the northward drift of population it nevertheless succeeded in clearing off all indebted- ness and putting its work upon a self-supporting basis, we cannot but admire the energy of its officers and the generous loyalty of its people.
CHAPTER XI PASTOR AND THEOLOGIAN: 1810-1850
"Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved."-Romans 10 : 1.
"Whatever subordinate ends, therefore, the Christian pulpit may secure in this or the coming world, its legitimate, paramount aim is the glory of God in the salva- tion of men."-GARDINER SPRING, "The Power of the Pulpit," p. 170.
T HE last chapter, although in many of its facts and incidents suggestive of the real life of the church, is for the most part only a description of the outer shell. It presents to us in detail the physical conditions under which the work of the church was carried on. We now turn to study that work itself, and we shall begin by tracing the career of him who was the church's leader throughout this period.
In a sense the whole religious life and activity that then existed in the Brick Church, all those matters, for example, that will be presented in the next three chapters, form a part of his biography. But there are certain more personal facts and events which may well be treated by themselves in a chapter especially devoted to him. And here it will be convenient to deal also with all the church's distinctly theological interests during these years, since in them the church could hardly be said to act at all except in the person of its pastor.
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GARDINER SPRING IN THE EARLY YEARS OF HIS PASTORATE From an oil portrait in the possession of his great-grandson, Shepherd Knapp
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For the whole period now under observation Gardiner Spring performed alone the duties of min- ister of the Brick Church. Dr. Rodgers' active work had ended, as we know, before his successor came. Even his service as moderator at the meetings of the Brick Church session in 1809 and 1810 had been performed with great difficulty and frequent interrup- tions. He was but waiting patiently for the end; and at length the end came when the new pastorate was less than a year old, on May 7th, 1811. It had greatly cheered Dr. Rodgers that, when he was called to go, he had already seen the church moving forward with promise under its new leader. During those last months, his biographer tells us, "he took his young colleague by the hand with paternal solicitude and affection, discovered great anxiety to promote his usefulness, and rejoiced in his talents and suc- cess."* Thus the mantle of Elijah fell upon Elisha's shoulders.
The task which Mr. Spring had assumed was ardu- ous, and, except for the force of character, the Christian spirit, and the consecrated purpose which he brought to his work, he was imperfectly prepared. "My theological attainments," he says, "were very limited," ; and it was necessary for him to continue as best he could the training and stocking of his mind. He began at once a thorough investigation of Christian doctrine, which he pursued, not only by reading, but also by conference and correspondence with his older contemporaries.
His progress, however, was necessarily slow, for the
* "Rodgers Mem.," p. 277.
t "Life and Times," Vol. I, p. 119.
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first demand upon his time was the vigorous perform- ance of his daily ministerial duties, and these were so engrossing that he seemed to have little leisure for aught else. "I neglected everything for the work of the ministry," he says, "I had a strong desire to visit the courts, and listen to the arguments of the eminent jurists of the city; but I had no time for this indulgence. I had none for light reading, none for evening parties, and very little for social visiting, or even extensive reading. Everything was abandoned for my pulpit ministrations. . . . Under God it was this laborious and unintermittent effort that saved me from shipwreck."* He was abundantly justified in asserting, as he did, that a faithful minister is in the most thorough sense "a working man."
Let him in his own words give us some idea of his method and habits of work. "There is nothing," he affirms, "of which I have been constrained to be more economical, and even covetous, than time. I have ever been an early riser, and even in mid-win- ter used to walk from Beekman Street ; round the 'Forks of the Bowery,' now Union Square, before I broke my fast. I usually went into my study at nine o'clock, and after my removal to Bond Street, more generally at eight, though my study was opposite the City Hall, and more than a mile from my residence." } This description of the prompt beginning of the day prepares us for his account of the system and regu-
* "Life and Times," Vol. I, pp. 104 f.
t Dr. Murray in his "Memorial Discourse" (p. 20), says: "He once told me that his first residence in the city being on Broadway, near Canal Street, he was obliged to walk across a number of open lots to get to his Thursday lectures, and on dark nights stood sometimes in dread of assault."
"Life and Times," Vol. I, p. 105.
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larity with which he produced his sermons. "For a series of years," he says, "I rarely retired to my pillow of a Lord's Day evening without having selected my subject for the following Lord's Day."* On Tuesday almost without exception he would begin actual work upon his sermon,; and with the same regularity he brought his writing to an end at Friday noon. Never except in two instances, he declares, had Saturday been devoted to the preparation of the sermon for the next day. It should be added, how- ever, that when the importance of the subject de- manded it, and when the assistance of other clergy- men made it possible, he would spend two, three, or even more, weeks in the preparation of one sermon.
He preached commonly from a manuscript, but when, as he occasionally did, he employed the ex- temporaneous method, he went to the other extreme, using no notes whatever, preferring to be absolutely untrammelled; and he records his opinion that some of his best and most profitable sermons were delivered in this way, by a method " so literally extemporaneous that from beginning to end I did not know beforehand what would be my next sentence." ¿ This success, however, he points out, was the result of previous mental discipline, in which the regular use of the pen had played a considerable part.
In regard to his written sermons it is significant in
* "Life and Times," Vol. I, p. 110.
+ In his "Letter to a Young Clergyman" ("Fragments from the Study of a Pastor," 1838, p. 117), Dr. Spring says: "One sermon a week, well planned, well digested, carefully written, and faithfully applied, is labor enough for any man who allows himself any time for intellectual improve- ment." He adds that, in that case, "you may draw upon your Text Book for two or three others without much preparation."
· į "Life and Times," Vol. I, p. 111.
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this connection to hear him say that when sometimes he had begun a sermon without any fixed method in his mind, he had almost always found it lost labor. "For the most part," he says, "my divisions and ar- rangements have been thoroughly premeditated; and so thoroughly that . . I have in many instances written the application first, and the body of my dis- course last." *
These facts in regard to his persevering and meth- odical industry go far toward explaining the success of Gardiner Spring as a preacher. But, of course, method could have produced but a mediocre result, had it not been inspired by something more spontane- ous and personal in the man himself, and been pro- vided with good material on which to work. For the first of these necessities we have his declaration, ut- tered with enthusiasm, that he "loved the work of writing sermons and preaching the gospel."t To him the routine and the system of it all were no drudg- ery, for his whole heart was in it. There was no other occupation in which he took so much delight. And as for the second necessity, material to work on, his strongly acquisitive and fertile brain kept him well supplied. His own reference to this subject is interesting, and especially because it incidentally dis- pels any notion that he was merely a student of books, as we may have hastily assumed. He was also, as he here shows us, a student of life. "I have rarely been embarrassed for want of subjects," he said in his later years. "The wonderful facility with which one subject leads to another, the state of the congregation, an interview with some individual or
* "Life and Times," Vol. I, p. 112. + Ibid., Vol. I, p. 106.
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family, a watchful observance of the leadings of Divine Providence, intercourse with ministerial brethren, some unexpected suggestion during the night-watches, a solitary ride on the saddle,* my index rerum and the inexhaustible treasures of the Bible, furnished me with subjects which I have not yet overtaken." t
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